Showing results by narrator "Nick Mondelli" in All Categories

Featuring all-new tales of dark fantasy, cosmic horror, supernatural revenge, and the sorcery of terror from masters of the craft, this issue includes stories and poems by Alma Katsu, Heather Graham, Maurice Broaddus, Fran Wilde, Priya Sharma, Anne Walsh, Yvonne Navarro, Jake Bible, Gabrielle Faust, and Christina Sng.

Caleb Becker left Paradise eight months ago, taking with him the secret he promised to take to his grave. If the truth got out, it would ruin everything. Maggie Armstrong tried to be strong after Caleb broke her heart and disappeared. Somehow, she managed to move on. She's determined to make a new life for herself. But then Caleb and Maggie are forced together on a summer trip. They try ignoring their passion for each other, but buried feelings resurface.

Sheriff Samuel Golden is a lonely man with nothing but work to fill his time. So when he busts a pretty young blonde in the midst of a theft, he's tempted by his immediate attraction to her. She's guilty as sin despite her protests to the contrary, but Sam can sense there's a lost little girl inside of her who just needs to be taught right from wrong. In lieu of jail, Sam agrees to take Krista in hand for thirty days for some bare bottom rehabilitation. But when their obvious chemistry becomes unavoidable, Sam will have to choose...

On the space station Olympus, a disappearance and a theft have captured the attention of the Intergalactic Police Force. Assigned to the case, Pryor heads to the World Ship in order to search for a missing prince. While there, he’s forced to work with the Emperor, Wystan Aurelius, who seems to never let Pryor out of his sight. Confused over why a man he’s never met is acting so possessive, Pryor’s urgency to solve the case and get away from Olympus and its ruler intensifies, even as the unruly Emperor starts to grow on him.

Ara, a high fae in the Marsh Court, was trained since birth to kill. When it comes down to it, can she sever the tendrils of her morality and do it? After being taken prisoner, she manages an escape riddled with questions, only to arrive home to absolute heartbreak. Discovering everything she knew to be a lie, she sets out on a dangerous journey to learn the truth of her upbringing. But when the hunters begin to come for her, she realizes she isn't the only one who will need her lethal skills.

Dr. Wolfgang Pike would love nothing more than to finish the requiem he’s composing for his late wife, but the ending seems as hopeless as the patients dying a hundred yards away at the Waverly Hills Tuberculosis sanatorium. If he can’t ease his own pain with music, he tries to ease theirs—but his boss thinks music is a waste, and in 1920s Louisville, the specter of racial tensions looms over everything. When a retired concert pianist arrives, Wolfgang is thrust into an orchestra of the most extraordinary kind that emerges to change everything.

r the death of his parents, Jim was sent to live with his grandparents in Black Hawk Nebraska. There he befriended Antonia, the daughter of Bohemian immigrants. Years later, Jim, now a successful lawyer in New York, returns to his childhood home and Antonia. Jim's love for Antonia has endured, much as she herself has endured tragic circumstances.

Broke up with, broke, and with a vicious case of writer's block, romance writer Gracie Landing is a hot mess. She can hardly be blamed for drinking one (or a few) too many cocktails when out with her besties in an attempt to cheer herself up. Sometime in the foggy wee hours, she recklessly emails her unrequited high-school crush, Colin Yarmouth, who is now a successful attorney harboring regrets of his own.

Nick Sorensen had once been one of the fastest men in hockey—until the devastating plane crash that took the lives of his best friends, leaving him the only survivor. Now he’s physically ready to get back on the ice, but his coach is concerned Nick isn’t doing as well, mentally, as he says he is. Case in point? Nick’s apartment is completely empty, apart from a single chair and a mattress on the floor.

I’ve always been the ugly duckling. I never expected my Prince Charming to be wearing Wranglers and dusty cowboy boots. Crushing on one of my hot cowboy bosses isn’t smart. Especially the playboy, but try telling my heart that—it won’t listen. Not even overhearing him call me “frumpy” will discourage my affections. I mean, he’s not wrong. But then we dance, and the look in his eyes changes. Then a kiss, then a lot more, and I can’t help hoping he’s seeing me in a different light.

Behind the screens, there’s no denying our electric chemistry, but at work, our rivalry grows stronger than ever. But when passion meets profession, will we redefine the Law of Attraction, or will our hearts face a ruthless cross-examination with no chance of appeal? This contemporary workplace romance is a standalone novel in the Paper Cuts series.

Angie is awakened by a midnight call from an officer with the Boise Police Department and thinks there must be a misunderstanding. The officer tells her that her husband was involved in a shooting at a local bar, but how can that be when her husband is sleeping right next to her? But when she turns to wake him, he isn’t there. Tessa is the 23-year-old bartender who escapes to a backroom storage closet during the shooting. When it comes to light that five people were killed, she is burdened with the question of why she survived.

Wily has never seen the sun or a blue sky or even his parents. He lives underground, creating traps to keep treasure-seekers away from the gold in an ancient wizard's dungeon. He spends his days mopping up giant slug slime, avoiding poison darts, and herding undead skeletons. It's all he knows. But then an unusual band of adventurers - an acrobatic elf, a warrior with a magic arm, and a giant made of moss - successfully defeat Wily's traps. And they want the ultimate treasure: Wily himself.

An eleven-year-old boy lives an idyllic childhood exploring the remote coastal plains and wetlands of South Carolina alongside his parents and his dog, Teach. But when the boy’s eerie and estranged grandfather shows up one day with no warning, cracks begin to form as hidden secrets resurface that his parents refuse to explain. The longer his grandfather outstays his welcome and the greater the tension between the adults grows, the more the boy feels something within him changing—physically—into something his grandfather welcomes and his mother fears. Something abyssal. Something monstrous.

Star Wars dominates the film world. The combined box office revenue of the Star Wars movies equates to over $10 billion, making it the second highest-grossing film franchise of all time. But this franchise is no blaster from the past. Its fantastically successful films have now been followed by multiple television series set in that same galaxy far, far away. The franchise’s flagship television series, and likely the firmest fan favorite for some time to come, is The Mandalorian.

On the morning of September 11, 2001, 16-year-old Kyle Donohue watches the first twin tower come down from the window of Stuyvesant High School. Moments later, terrified and fleeing home to safety across the Brooklyn Bridge, he stumbles across a girl perched in the shadows, covered in ash, and wearing a pair of costume wings.

As a member of the Charmers Council, Gaige is able to form lasting bonds with the magical beasts of his world. At least, he used to be a Charmer...until he died and was brought back as one of the immortal assassins of Cruor. Now he's far more dangerous...and something beyond the shadows lies in wait, hungry to claim him for its own.

Alec Mansfield haunts my memories like a cruel specter. In high school, he was my tormentor and the bane of my existence. When he wasn’t defying authority alongside my older brothers, he was sabotaging my dates and sending me “anonymous" messages signed “yours cruelly.” Alec was merciless, an emerald-eyed devil spending his daddy’s money and wreaking havoc over our hometown of Sapphire Shores like he owned the place. But mostly, he hated that I didn’t fawn over him like all the other girls did. It’s been ten years since he left town. But now he’s back.

A daughter of rock ’n’ roll royalty has a secret crush. A lonely ticket-taker worries about his sister. An almost-famous songwriter nurses old wounds. A stage manager tires of being behind the scenes. A singer-songwriter struggles to untangle her feelings for her best friend and his girlfriend. In this live-out-loud anthology, the disparate protagonists of 16 stories are thrown together for one unforgettable event: their high school’s battle of the bands.

Mari Manos has never been able to hide her cancer survivorship. She wakes every morning, grabs her pink forearm clip crutches, and starts her day. Mari loves Camp Chemo—where she's developed a healthy crush on fellow camper Jase. At Camp, she knows that she'll never get the look or have to explain her amputation to anyone. Jase wants to move on, to never reveal his past. But when Mari transfers to his school, he knows she could blow his cover. That's the last thing he wants, but he also cannot ignore his attraction to her.